The Florida Gators men’s tennis team (9-8, 3-4 SEC) returned home Friday, beating the Ole Miss Rebels (9-8, 2-4 SEC) 4-0.
In yet another indoor conference match for Florida, they came out strong clinching the doubles point in a tiebreaker, and that momentum carried over into singles.
In the doubles session, the matches on Courts 2 and 3 were split between the two teams in dominant fashion. The doubles point came down to the nail-biter on Court 1 between Florida’s No. 67-ranked duo of junior Nate Bonetto and freshman Aidan Kim and the Rebels’ No. 65-ranked senior duo of Nikola Slavic and Lukas Engelhardt.
Both teams held serve the entire set, thus pushing the match to a tiebreaker. With Bonetto set to serve, leading 5-4, the Gators had the doubles point on their racket. Bonetto and Kim closed out the tiebreaker 7-4.
Leading the match 1-0, the Gators looked to come out strong in singles and they did just that. Bonetto struck first for Florida with a dominant win on Court 3 against Rebels sophomore Isac Stromberg. From the first point of the match, Bonetto was laser-focused, carrying him to a 6-4, 6-1 victory to give the Gators a 2-0 lead in the match.
Next to finish was the match on Court 2 between Kim and Ole Miss senior John Hallquist Lithen. The first set between these two took well over an hour with multiple momentum swings. The set was pushed to a tiebreaker where Kim edged out the win. After a long break between sets, Kim came out flying and took the second set in dominant fashion, winning 6-3.
The clincher for Florida came on Court 1 where Gator freshman and No. 66-ranked Jeremy Jin and the Rebels’ No. 62-ranked Slavic battled for over two hours, playing three sets. Jin took the first set convincingly 6-3. The second set was a war. Every single game each was fought tooth and nail for each and every point.
The second set was pushed to a tiebreaker where Slavic remained composed and took it. Jin bounced back quickly with an immediate hold of serve followed by a break of serve. He never looked back, winning the set 6-1 and claiming the match for the Gators 4-0.
Gators head coach Adam Steinberg said after the match that he was pleased with the team's mentality going into the match, especially coming off of a few tough losses.
“Today, I thought we walked out on the court with the right mindset in doubles, and we walked out on the court with the right mindset in singles,” Steinberg said. “Sometimes with a young team, the losses can mount and it can really damage their psyche a little bit, but I felt it this week in practice, they came out with this great response.”
The Gators look to remain undefeated at home on Sunday as they take on No. 15 Mississippi State at noon.
Contact Chandler Hawkes at chawkes@alligator.org. Follow him on Twitter @HawkesChandler.
